Sunflower🌻

It was like waking up from a nightmare, only to discover he was still in a nightmare and it was the same one. 

Playing over and over in his head like a movie, one he was forced to sit through every time he closed his eyes.

“Who the hell is Bucky?”

“Drawing me like one of your French girls, huh?”

“You know me too well.”

“Hm-mh, why draw something when you can have the real deal though?”

“... give me three minutes.”

Backpacking through a summer’s forest was one of the few things that actually made him happy anymore. It was the perfect way to get away from the constant rush of the city, and revel in the peace and calm of the woods. It was amazing how easily it could put a halt to the chaos in his head. 

Until he got lost, of course. 

He should have paid better attention to the roads and the signs, especially in a forest as large as this one. Gods be thanked, he hadn’t strayed off the path, so there was still a fairly large chance he would run into a cyclist or another backpacker. Before he could do so, though, he stumbled onto a little house. It sat tucked neatly between the trees, the garden filled with all kinds of flowers, and there was a large vegetable bed. A few chickens wandered around, pecking at the ground and flapping their little wings. 

Bucky grabbed his backpack a little tighter, and went towards the house. Whoever lived there probably knew the forest like the back of their hand, and asking for directions could never hurt. 

Peering through the window, it did not seem like anyone was home. He went up to the door and rapped his knuckles on the wood. Nothing. Just as he was about to turn around and try the other way, a voice jarred him out of his thoughts. 

“Can I help you?”

When Bucky turned around he lost all coherent thoughts. The voice belonged to a man with hair like a halo, and skin that had an almost golden sheen to it, dappled with freckles across his nose. His eyes put the summer blue sky to shame, and even the ocean could be jealous. In his hands, he was carrying a basket filled with wild flowers. 

“Uhh,” Bucky said, trying to find the words he had so suddenly lost, “I- uhh, I got lost.”

The man smiled, his plump, rosy lips curling up so sweetly Bucky’s legs went weak. “Aw, you poor thing. Why don’t you come inside, so we can sort everything out?”

Oh well. Bucky wasn’t gonna say no to that. 

|X|

Or: Steve lives in a small cottage in the forest, and occasionally he helps out a lost traveler who took the wrong turn. Today, that traveler is Bucky, who likes Steve’s homemade apple pie and sweet smile so much, he might have gotten lost again the next day. 

Steve doesn’t mind. 

The moment he opened his eyes he should have known something was wrong.

His body didn’t feel right, his sight different, moving around was strange to say the least, as if the weight of his body parts did not add up to what he was used to. 

Even stranger was being met with the worried and relieved faces of people he didn’t even recognize. They spoke to him in what seemed to be a mix of languages, because they kept repeating a word he did not know. They held his hand, but it was not right. Nothing was. He kept silent, trying to wrap his head around the memories he seemed to be missing. He did not tell them of it, that would be really rude, so he said nothing. 

After a few moments of waking up, trying to clear his head but feeling it pound like it hadn’t in such a long time, he finally realizes what they’re saying. It’s not another language, it was a name. 

Bucky. 

His name was not Bucky, neither did he know anyone with that name. The very second he finally caught a glimpse of himself in a reflective surface, and a strange face stared back at him, he knew something had gone terribly, horribly wrong. This was not his body. 

The people smiled at him, he smiled back. If he told them now they would declare him insane. He would just have to wait until he could get out of this bed and find himself. Literally.

|X|

Or: when the Avengers struggled to take the magical artifacts of an evil wizard, Steve had accidentally run onto the road and got hit by a car. Badly injured, he was brought to the hospital. There, he woke up in the body of Bucky Barnes, a guy he had never heard of before.  

Bucky Barnes just wanted a bagel. Then he saw Captain America dart in front of his car like some rogue deer, and the collision was... shattering, to say the least. The next thing he knows, he wakes up in a hospital with some strange people he’s pretty sure are Thor and the Falcon sitting around him. And oh, he looks like Steve Rogers, so that’s perfect. 

The last thing Steve expected was to share a dorm room with Mr. Popular, the guy who always got the best grades, the most friends and got invited to the biggest parties. He thought the guy would be with someone he actually liked, someone he knew. 

If Steve was even known around here, it was as the rebel who got into fights with bullies on college grounds - in his defense, they were assholes.

And that also really got into the way of his plans. His previous dorm mate had not cared if he walked around naked or in his boxer shorts, got home with bruises after a fight, or was very outspoken about political issues - he worried this one would. The last thing he wanted was to get into a fight the very first day.

When James Barnes strode into the room, with his stupid denim jacket and his stupid hair, Steve acted as nonchalant as he could. 

“Are you wearing pants?” was the very first thing Barnes said to him. 

“Would you like it if I said ‘no’?” was the very first thing Steve said back. 

This promised to be an epic roommate experience. 

A small smile ticked up the corners of his lips, even when he could not see the animal anymore. It had finally given up, and it would be his. He had won. The last strike would soon be delivered, and the village would be safe once again. No more children grabbed and eaten. No more loved ones ripped away. They could finally sleep easy knowing they were safe, knowing their family was safe, and their animals too. Knowing they had justice for the ones they had lost, and that it would never happen again.

Drawing in a deep breath, he stalked closer, step by step, the thrill of the case pushing up his throat and coiling in his stomach. He had his crossbow out, hands gripping the wood. He pulled himself out of the grabby branches of the thicket, aiming his arrow at the creature pressed up against the tree and…

It was not a wolf. 

James could not look away. Shock filled every part of his face, freezing every single part of his body and he could not move. He stared at the tree, following the blood trail up to the creature that was not a creature at all.

It was a man.

The man was naked as the day he was born, not a shred of clothes on his body to cover the skin that lay exposed to the cruel tip of the readied arrow on James’ crossbow.

Short, honey golden locks that shone in the rising sun stuck to the man’s sweaty forehead, partially obscuring a set of perfectly round circles of ocean blue. All the thousand shades of the spring sky and the deepest seas swirled together to form a whirlpool of hues, with specks of fear gleaming through the masses. Hurried breaths flew across his trembling, cherry red plump lips, and tears had caught in the pitch black lashes that fanned out against his golden skin, sparkling in the light like little droplets in a spider’s web.

Without his intention, James’ heart clenched painfully in his chest, dropping low enough to crush through the bottom of his stomach. The leg that was on James’ side, the one most exposed to him, was trembling most uncontrollably, the long shaft of an arrow sticking out from the thigh where blood pooled and poured out of the broken skin. It had made quite the wound.

Then it all caught up to him, and it made no sense at all.

|X|

Or: After a series of gruesome deaths, a village has had enough of the beast picking off both adults and children, and they call in an old friend and renowned hunter, James Barnes. 

James wastes no time tracking the beast down, and he fires an arrow into the beast’s flank. Wounded and panicked, the beast flees, but James goes after it, chasing it through the woods and taking a kind of sick satisfaction out of seeing the monster that had taken children stumble and whine in its pain. 

Only, when James finally catches up to it, he sees that it isn’t a beast at all, but a man, a guardian of the forest trying to take down the monster itself. Guilt-ridden, James vouches to protect the creature while it’s wounded, and help it kill the true monster once and for all. 

“In my defense, all that tight leather made you look like a class 5 bad guy ready to leave no witnesses.” Steve’s lips curled up into something of an innocent smile, though it was something daring at nature, as if stepping into a lion’s cage and pulling the tail of the biggest one he could find.  

The guy quirked an eyebrow, leaning forward towards the window, eyes never ceasing their piercing stare. “And so you decided to charge forward with a hand gun while I walked there with a grenade launcher, two machine guns and an arsenal of knives?”

Steve huffed. “Don’t tell me my pretty face didn’t distract you.”

“It didn’t. At least, not until your ass caught my attention.”

Alright. Steve about had it with this guy. 

|X|

Or: Steve has always wanted to be a beacon of justice, and he knows that in order to start change you have to be higher up. SHIELD seems a nice place to start, but how does one get into SHIELD, exactly?

That question is solved when a bunch of terrorists terrorize the city, Steve tries to get all the innocent people out of harm’s way, and then attacks the Winter Soldier thinking him to be one of the bad guys, only to get pinned down and told he’s with SHIELD, and Steve needs to get out of the way. 

Only Steve is not getting out of the way. His journey just got the kick start he had been hoping for. If only he could get the attention of the infamous Winter Soldier...

Broken glass cracked beneath the soles of his heavy boots, cold wind blowing through the cracks of the groaning house he did enter. The floorboards creaked, the wood vocalizing its awakening after the many years of peaceful slumber, and the door swayed back and forth on its last two hinges. 

Soft breaths spun through the hallway, the sound an echo of the laughter it used to carry around the stone walls. The wind blew in from behind, playing with the gentle curls of his hair, moving out before him. It curled around his legs, pushing against his back, almost as if meaning to take his hand and guide him through a place he knew so well.

Pieces of wallpaper peeled from the sides, the paint of furniture flaking off like snow twirling from the heavens, gathering in scattered piles on the floor. 

No one was home. 

His blues did bleed with grief.

The comfortable chair in the living room was empty, not a trace to be found of the one he was looking for. The table was broken down, the room stripped of its value. A flame of pain flared in his chest, quickly entrapped by the winter cold of his gaping memories and lost thoughts. 

His fingers trailed across the armrest, feeling the rough fabric beneath the sensitive tips. Dust stuck to him, and a frown came beneath his brows when his eye fell onto the layer of dust lying on the seat of the chair. It was not pristine or kept, not like the rest of the uninterrupted picture of what had once been his home. 

The dust was uneven, a part of it gone as if someone had sat in the chair just recently. 

He closed his eyes. 

|X|

Or: Steve does not feel well, and it’s only getting worse. 

With the strange behavior of his STRIKE team, the many memories like a storm in his head, and the sighting of a man who should long be gone, Steve feels he’s plummeting down a deep dark hole he cannot get out from. 

“I won’t stop till all of HYDRA is either dead or captured.”

And that was exactly what he was going to do. 

Sunlight filtered through the large window, giving a greenish glow as it draped across the grass strip around the building. 

Steve reached his arms into the air, stretching them to full capacity before relaxing his muscles and arching his back towards his left, one of his feet floating above the floor as he moved himself in a slow circle. 

There were quite some who tended to avoid this particular studio, because of the large windows, but Steve did not mind. It was not that difficult to come from the gates - that were opened nearly all day - to the property of the semi-large building. If any peeping Tom were to sneak onto the grounds, they could easily sneak a peak into the studio. Steve did care about peeping Tom's, but if he caught any he would surely throw them out. 

 When he made another spin, carefully positioning his legs as they moved like solid grace beneath him, arms waving like ribbons in the wind, he caught movement somewhere through the window. His eyebrows knitted together in a frown, almost angrily. If it was that annoying guy again, the one with the extreme ideas and violent friends who never missed an opportunity to creep on the dancers, he would call the police. 

It was not him, though. 

It was the young skater. 

Steve stilled in his careful steps on the floor, one leg curled against his other with his knee poking aside, arms still raised above his head and lashes fluttering against the light. He watched with curiosity as the guy in the black skinny jeans rolled up idly onto the stone pavement. Cocking his head to the side - like a confused puppy, as Nat usually called it - he watched the guy sway his hips side to side as the board moved along beneath his feet. 

 Perhaps Steve had full control over his body on the floor, he did not think he would ever master the sway of the board. The wheels beneath the plank seemed so... unpredictable to him, as if they could decide to give out or stop moving at any moment, jam whenever they saw fit and hurl him forwards onto a harsh, unforgiving ground. 

That thought did not seem to scare the young man as he pushed himself forward faster, going through his legs slightly onto to jump up and flip the board beneath his feet. 

Steve was only just in time to keep himself from slipping and dropping both his foot and arms, because the way the guy did it seemed so easy. As if that was not enough, the man jumped once more, flipping the board so easily it was as if he had never done anything else in his life. 

Knowing he had to maintain his posture and focus on his own, Steve continued his careful steps, bare toes pressing against the somewhat cold floor of the studio. 

However, he could not keep his eyes from wandering, and a surge of warmth blossomed up on his cheeks as he dared to peek through the window again, feeling nigh amazed by the way the skater moved around.

|X|

Or: Steve Rogers is a professional dancer, and Bucky Barnes the skater punk who’s really keen on impressing him. 

It was a good life, a simple life, without too much ado. 

Retired from a soldier’s duty, withdrawing into the safety of his little cabin with only nature and its animals to keep him company. No one to order him around, no one to bother him. 

That was, until the mysterious rider came knocking on his door. 

|X|

Or: Steve is a retired soldier from the king’s army, resting from his latest war in his cabin, feeling nothing to return to the field of unjust battles. Then, a new king gets appointed, but Steve still does not want to have anything to do with the kingdom. 

When said king knocks on his door, though, he soon figures what he wills and wants has little to say in the matter. 

Only he does not mind, because this battle is not unjust. 

“Oh great, there’s flour all over my pants!”

“At least now everyone knows who that ass belongs to.”

|X|

Or: Owning one of the best bakeries in town was a tough enough job on itself, Bucky really did not have time for a boyfriend. Steve, however, was not just a boyfriend. The guy couldn’t cook to save his life, but his baking skills were off the charts. 

And well, if Bucky occasionally put his flour-covered hands on Steve’s ass to mark his territory, who’s to blame him?

Why must it always be you who is torn from my grasp?

Why can they not take another- anyone, really?

Why must it be you who leaves my side?

And why do they make you like it?

|X|

Or: Steve is a soldier who can never come home, thrown into the battlefield again and again, and many times more. 

Bucky is the one who is has to watch him bleed from his body and his soul, who is there every time he leaves, and who would do anything to make him stay.